Hold On To What You've Got
by LostInLost18
Summary: My first Glee fic :  Set after 2x09 Special Education. Finn gets some advice from an unlikely source who, even more surprisingly, sticks up for Rachel. One-shot for now, might turn into a story if it generates enough interest.


Hold On To What You've Got

Summary: Set post Special Education. Finn rants about Rachel's behaviour to a certain step-brother, who, surprisingly, sticks up for her, giving Finn some advice into the bargain. My first Glee fic, so be nice lol.

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Finn stormed into his house, upset beyond words, and more than a little heartbroken. _How could she have betrayed me like that? _With the whole Quinn/Puck thing, there had been faults on both sides but, here, he knew it was entirely her fault. No matter how low down on the moral scale Puck was, at least he'd pulled away at the right moment, whereas who would've known how far she would've gone to exact her revenge?

He was beginning to wonder if he really knew her at all.

He stormed straight upstairs, surprised to see Kurt lounged across his bed, flicking through some fashion magazines.

"Kurt?" he said uncertainly. "What are you doing in my room?"

With a dramatic sigh, Kurt shut the magazine and sat up straight, focusing his gaze on Finn.

"I came to see if you were alright," he replied, scrutinising Finn's expression carefully. "I heard about yours and Rachel's…break up, and whilst normally I'd be the first to congratulate you on your newfound freedom, I thought I'd offer you a chance to talk. Brother to brother." He flashed him a smile.

Finn was shell shocked by one part of Kurt's reply.

"How did you hear?" he demanded. "I haven't told _anyone_…" His eyes widened in realization. "It was Rachel wasn't it? She told you?"

He couldn't help that his voice turned accusatory towards the end, only because in his current mood it was just easier to let it do so. He wasn't in any mood to try and justify her behaviour.

"If you can call a hysterical phone call, telling me, then yes, she told me," Kurt replied dryly. "Poor girl was in such a state. She said I was the only person she could talk to." He sighed. "I almost felt sorry for her."

Finn felt uncomfortable, as he normally did whenever he heard Rachel was upset. It wasn't necessarily that she was upset, but her dramatic tendencies meant that she could take something small and make it into something bigger than it needed to be. The few fights they'd had always ended with her storming off and him, as the pathetic one of the two, calling after her, begging her to listen to reason. Now, it'd been the other way round, and he wasn't sure he liked the change.

Whether you liked Rachel or Berry or not, her dramatic storm offs weren't exactly unknown to the entire study body.

"If you know we broke up, you'll also know why we did," he said, throwing his schoolbag to the floor in a huff, launching himself onto the bed.

"Yes, I did manage to decipher enough to get the gist," Kurt replied, glancing at Finn with some concern. "You know, I'm surprised what with the Santana-Gate incident, you didn't see something like this coming."

"So it's my fault?" Finn's tone was angry. "She _cheated _on me. What she did to me was a thousand times worse than what I did to her."

"True." Kurt sounded mild, if only to keep the peace. "I'm not condoning what she did, Finn, but take a walk in her shoes. I mean, it's not like you've the best track record when it comes to women. You cheated on Quinn with Rachel. You slept with Santana…" He trailed off when he saw Finn's look. "I don't think we need a third."

Finn struggled to come up with a comeback for a moment, although he winced at the memory. He had a feeling Quinn would've forgiven him for what he'd done, if only to keep their relationship alive for the good of her popularity status. But with Rachel…What drove him insane was how hypocritical she was being! She'd begged him to take her back when she'd told him she'd tried to sleep with Puck, yet had had thrown the world's most dramatic tantrum when something he'd done outside their relationship had come out.

"That was different," he eventually said.

"How?" Kurt demanded.

"I loved Rachel," Finn yelled, his face turning red.

"Quinn loved you," Kurt gently reminded him. "You stuck by her when no one else would during the whole Baby-Gate thing." He rolled his eyes. "I'm losing track of all the Gates this Glee club has gone through."

With a heavy sigh, Finn leaned back against the headboard of his bed, contemplating. How was he supposed to get through something like this? This…This just damn well hurt, like his heart was being crippled or something.

"Why are you sticking up for Rachel?" he suddenly asked, suspicious. "You hate her. I don't remember a day when you haven't bitched or moaned about her."

"I saw a glimpse of the real Rachel at Sectionals," Kurt said, his tone one of reminiscence. "I saw a nicer, kinder, more real side to her, and it was almost like we were friends in that moment. I, of all people, am not one to so gaily, excuse the pun, dismiss the idea of giving second chances to people." He chuckled lightly at his own joke. "I figured if I could give Rachel a second chance, so could you."

"No." Finn was adamant. "I've seen her be manipulative, selfish, and just a plain bitch but never was she intentionally cruel. I don't know if we can get through this. Not now. Not after everything."

"Whilst I would normally be waving the Team Finn banner, and cracking open some champagne at this victory for the Hudsons at having been freed from such a terror, I wouldn't dismiss the idea of a reconciliation," Kurt said, glancing at Finn's confused expression with a mixture of amusement and despair.

"A what?" Finn asked blankly.

"Getting back together," Kurt clarified.

"I don't know if we will," Finn croaked, rubbing his eyes angrily to hide back the oncoming tears. "Not this time. What I did was bad but at least we weren't dating at the time."

Kurt sighed loudly, his expression unfathomable, for once. Normally, you could read his every emotion, if not because he liked to project his emotions (like Rachel), than because he was a sensitive kid, naturally.

"Well, don't say I didn't try," he said, fanning through his magazine again. "But I will say another thing," he reluctantly added. "Although we, as a group, all found her irritatingly snobby, and annoying, and prissy…the one thing we noticed which seemed to take up her attention more than herself was you. She couldn't stop staring at you, even when you were with Quinn. We even took bets," he added matter-of-factly.

"Bets? On what?" Finn asked suspiciously, noting with interest the use of the past tense when Kurt had described what the rest of Glee thought of Rachel.

"On how long it would take you to get your head out of the clouds and act on it," Kurt said, grinning. "Honestly, half the time you seemed so clueless of your own emotions, I just wanted to scream it at you. Except…" He suddenly blushed, remembering the reason why.

"Because you liked me," Finn replied matter-of-factly.

"Well, that's in the past, isn't it?" Kurt said hurriedly. "That's not the point. I just hope I've made you think about things, anyway."

Finn stared at his now step-brother, trying to decide what it was he was supposed to think about exactly. Taking back Rachel? Maybe…But it wasn't a decision he was going to rush into. Yes, he still loved her. She'd hurt him, though, and he remembered someone saying that the more you loved someone, the more you could hate them when things turned sour. There was, indeed, a very fine line between love and hate, and both were encumbered under the category of passion.

But he'd hurt her too, probably more times than she'd hurt him. All those times he'd seen her forlornly glance his way, all the locker slams he'd heard, all the broken smiles he'd seen her try and fix were evidence of that.

"This isn't just about Rachel, is it?" he suddenly asked, following a train of thought.

"Yes and no," was Kurt's evasive reply. "I miss New Directions," he admitted. "I miss the drama, Mercedes, the whole shebang. And after careful consideration, as well as several insanity tests, I've concluded I even miss one Miss Rachel Berry too." He chuckled. "Funny old world isn't it?"

Finn didn't reply. Words, not for the first time, escaped him. It was strange how Kurt always seemed to be who rendered him speechless and, wistfully, he wished he'd been a better friend, a better brother, to him. The times Kurt had helped him vastly outnumbered the times he'd helped him, and he felt guilty about that.

It also made him think about Rachel, whether letting her fall into the sepia tones of his past was a fatal mistake. She'd seemed so…broken when he'd broken up with her, and her last, haunting words clung to the air, clung to his mind, refusing to let go.

_"You said you'd never break up with me." _

It was almost a scream, the way she'd belted out those raw, passionate, emotional words.

_"I never thought you'd make me feel this way."_

And he'd cut them down, almost cruelly, his heart torn into shreds.

_I don't know if we can get back what we lost, Rach, _he thought miserably. _I don't know if we're meant to live happily ever after, like we want to. _

Oh God, did he want to.

**A/n: Well, that's it. Kind of depressing one-shot but I may develop this into a story if it generates enough interest. For now, however, this will a one-shot. I love the Kurt/Rachel in this season so far! :)**


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